With all of the discussion about collision damage, what's visable, etc. I thought I would relate my one experience. Several years ago I experience a head-on with a runner on a local bike path. I was going ~17 mph and he made a sudden U-turn about 5 feet ahead of me. No time to do anything but hit say "shi..." before the collision. The impact was enough to momentarily bend the top and down tubes about 1" behind the lugs at the head tube. This was on a late 70's not collectable Fuji track bike, and yes I had a front brake but didn't have time to use it.
Anyway, apparently the original paint was less elastic than the steel tubing, which didn't show any obvious bends, etc. The paint had cracked at the the suspect locations. I took the bike to a local bike shop owner (who is also a list member), for an opinion. He said that he would need to remove the paint at the suspect areas, and after removing the paint and an inspection said that continued use of the frame shouldn't be a problem. (A verbal, not legally binding opinion - which was all I was looking for.)
I probably put well over 1000 commuting miles on that bike before selling it to another club member - the incident was fully disclosed. He had the bike repainted, and is still riding it with no problems. Again, this was not a collectable bike, safe use was the issue - not collectable value.
Is one of the more obvious visual clues to impact cracking of the paint. Is a repaint or removal of all paint a clue that something may have happened?
Ben Sanford (who recently bought a different Masi off e-bay) Falls Church, VA